Port Forwarding Explained

NOTE: THE FOLLOWING TROUBLESHOOTING STEPS ONLY APPLY TO SETTING UP YOUR CAMERA FOR REMOTE VIEWING. THEY ARE NOT REQUIRED FOR USE OF YOUR CAMERA WITHIN YOUR WIFI NETWORK.

What is a port and what is a “Universal Plug and Play” (UPnP) router?

A port is a “port of entry” or a door to gain entry to your router from outside of your home network . Think of it as a door to a room and your router as a high rise building with thousands of rooms. To get into those rooms from OUTSIDE YOUR WIFI NETWORK you need a username and password to enter. The default port, or room number for your camera is 8150.

A Universal Plug and Play router, or UPnP, refers to a router that automatically knows that certain applications use certain ports and allows access to that application through the router’s firewall with a username and password. If your router is not UPnP enabled, its’ OK, it just requires an extra step to tell your router to go to port 8150 to get to your camera explained below. To verify that your router is UPnP, please look at CNET’s 2010 List of UPnP routers.

I can’t view or hear my camera from outside my WiFi Network. Example: “I’m using the random IP address assigned to my camera (example: 192.168.1.150) and the port of 8150 (http://192.168.1.150:8150) which works perfectly on my Mac, PC, iPhone etc. from anywhere in my house but I can’t get to the audio and video feed from outside my network.”

This is because when you are home, you can access your camera directly. When you are outside your home network, you need to first go through your router’s firewall to get to your camera’s IP address.

Your computer or iPhone / iPad needs to know what router to go to and what port to enter to find your camera.

By default, UPnP is enabled on your camera. You can verify this be going to SETTINGS> NETWORK > UPNP SETUP and make sure everything is checked “enabled.”

Then you need to use the external IP address of your router and the port. You can find your router’s external IP address by going to http://whatismyipaddress.com. Example: An IP address of 99.32.179.91 and the port of 8150 =http://99.32.179.91:8150. You will then get to the sign in screen and will be asked for a username and password.

OK. It looks like my router is not UPnP enabled. What do I do?

What you are going to do is commonly referred to as Port Forwarding or Port Mapping. Don’t worry, it’s not as complicated as it sounds. It’s usually a 5 step process and we have links to detailed, visual guides to walk you though it, each designed for your specific router.

All of these guides can be found at PORTFORWARD.COMDO NOT PAY $29.99 when a popup appears! Access to the guides are free. Follow the steps below to access screen shot guides for your router.If you need further assistance we will help you directly by submitting a support ticket.